From enormous marketplaces such as eBay and Craigslist to emerging sectors such as peer-to-peer lending (Zopa), "swap trading" (Swaptree), and car sharing (Zipcar), Collaborative Consumption is disrupting outdated modes of business and reinventing not only what we consume but how we consume. While ranging enormously in scale and purpose, these companies and organizations are redefining how goods and services are exchanged, valued, and created—in areas as diverse as finance and travel, agriculture and technology, and education and retail. Traveling among global entrepreneurs and revolutionaries and exploring rising ventures as well as established companies adapting to these opportunities, authors Rachel Botsman and Roo Rogers outline in bold and imaginative ways how Collaborative Consumption may very well change the world. Anyone interested in the business opportunities and social power of collaboration will enjoy this smart, timely book.

    Simply by applying a few easy sewing, darning, felting, or crocheting techniques, as well as some sashiko and other favorite embroidery stitches, you can repair your favorite pieces in a transformative way. These techniques don't just save you money, but make your life more joyful, fulfilling and sustainable in an age of disposable "fast fashion." Author Noriko Misumi teaches you her philosophy of mending and reusing items based on the age-old Japanese concepts of mindfulness and Wabi Sabi (an appreciation of old and imperfect things). In her book, she shows you how to: Repair any kind of fabric that is torn, ripped or stained-whether knitted or woven Work with damaged flat or curved surfaces to make them aesthetically pleasing again Create repairs that blend in, as well as bold or whimsical visible repairs Darn your handmade or expensive gloves, sweaters and socks to make them look great again The joy to be found in working with your hands and the personal artistry you discover within yourself lie at the heart of this book. While nothing lasts forever, there's pleasure, as well as purpose, in appreciating age and imperfection. Joyful Mending allows you to surround yourself with the things that truly give you joy, whether they were given to you by a loved one, picked up in your travels or simply have a special place in your heart.

    They're planting tomatoes in raised beds, runner beans in small plots, and strawberries in containers. But there is one place that has, until now, been woefully neglected—the front yard. And there's good reason. The typical veggie garden, with its raised beds and plots, is not the most attractive type of garden, and favorite edible plants like tomatoes and cucumbers have a tendency to look a scraggily, even in their prime. But The Edible Front Yard isn't about the typical veggie garden, and author Ivette Soler is passionate about putting edibles up front and creating edible gardens with curb appeal. Soler offers step-by-step instructions for converting all or part of a lawn into an edible paradise; specific guidelines for selecting and planting the most attractive edible plants; and design advice and plans for the best placement and for combining edibles with ornamentals in pleasing ways. Inspiring and accessible, The Edible Front Yard is a one-stop resource for a front-and-center edible garden that is both beautiful and bountiful year-round.

    And rightly so: in our increasingly visual culture, it is an omnipresent form of creativity, something we are all influenced by whether we like it or not. Every logo, every poster, every CD cover confronts us with graphic design in some shape or form. It is the basis of all visual communication and arguably the most pervasive creative discipline of our times. designers arranged in an A to Z order. Each of the designers is featured over two double-page spreads, which are extensively illustrated with examples of their work. Alongside these examples, a 400 word text by the selecting curator explains his/her choice and illuminates the depicted work. The reproductions are further complemented with extended captions and biographical information on the designer. designers. Showcasing talents from Minneapolis to Macao, Area opens the door to the work of emerging designers practising in more than 25 countries around the world. It reflects a unique multitude of styles, ideas, and influences: an endless range of creativity from the playful, digital graphics of Eboy in Berlin, to the regional aesthetics of Chaz Mavyanne Davies of Zimbabwe or Ahn Sang-Soo of Korea; from the political awareness of Iran's Reza Abedini, to the more sober and traditional designs of the Italy's Leonardo Sonnoli. were also asked to choose what they consider a design 'classic, ' i.e. a piece of printed design from any era that is of particular significance to them. These 'classic' pieces are showcased in the shorter, second part of the book, each accompanied by a brief text explaining how the 'classic' piece fits into the selecting curator's general view and philosophy of graphic design. design, Area promises to be unique in its exciting design, its clear and interesting concept, its truly global scope, and its fresh and unconventional content

    Logolounge features the work of superstar artists and firms such as Michael Vanderbyl and Sibley Peteet Design and includes both new campaigns and never-before-seen projects. With 2,000 logos from a variety of sources, this visually compelling volume will become the go-to resource for inspiration from the best in the field.

    So any strategy without sustainability at its core is just plain irresponsible - bad for business, bad for shareholders, bad for the environment. These challenges represent unprecedented opportunities for big brands - such as Clorox, Dell, Toyota, Procter & Gamble, Nike, and Wal-Mart - that are implementing integral, rather than tangential, strategies for sustainability. What these companies are doing illuminates the book's practical framework for change, which involves engaging employees, using transparency as a business tool, and reaping the rewards of a networked organizational structure.Leave your quaint notions of corporate social responsibility and environmentalism behind. Werbach is starting a whole new dialogue around sustainability of enterprise and life as we know it in organizations and individuals. Sustainability is now a true competitive strategic advantage, and building it into the core of your business is the only means to ensure that your company - and your world - will survive.

    In Design Is the Problem, Nathan Shedroff examines how the endemic culture of design often creates unsustainable solutions, and shows how to ensure that design processes lead to more sustainable products and services.

    Hilton doesn’t just teach you how to get your plants to thrive—he teaches you how to bond with them.” Apartment TherapyBestselling author Hilton Carter brings his unique eye and love of plants to show you how to create luscious interiors that not only look amazing but are good for your well-being, too. Showcasing all-new photography, Hilton gives you inspiration on how you can use plants to decorate your home. In the first part of the book, he guides you through every part of the home, demonstrating the plants that are most suited to each room, those that thrive in the tropical humidity of bathrooms, the erratic heat changes of kitchens, and plants that can live happily in indirect light. Then, in the second section, Hilton takes you on tours of 12 inspiring homes that show the versatility of decorating with plants, with ideas for all types of spaces, from small urban apartments to balconies, terraces, and backyards. Packed full of interior design advice such as using dramatic plants like fiddle-leaf figs to create a focal point, and how to assemble the perfect plant shelf with succulents and cacti. Hilton will show you how bringing houseplants into your home creates instant impact and has health benefits such as cleaner air and an improvement in stress levels. Be inspired to create your own Wild Interiors with Hilton’s expert styling advice, his hints and tips on plant care that take the mystery out of looking after your new plants, plus his top ten favorite house plants.

    Whether you are looking to cultivate an entire indoor garden, or simply wish to know more about your single cactus, you can be sure to find the right information for you amongst the seventy-five plants in this stylish guide. And the best bit? All the plants are easy to maintain so even the most timid of gardeners can enjoy turning their hand to this green-fingered pastime. Learn how to care for succulents, cacti, flowering and foliage plants even with a full-time job, with this unique gardening guide that is made to fit alongside our modern-day schedules. With endless inspiration to brighten up your home,desk or office, this beautiful book of plants from across the world is a must for lovers of art and design, as well as plants.

    "Basics of Web Design: HTML5 and CSS3, 2e "covers the basic concepts that web designers need to develop their skills: Introductory Internet and Web concepts Creating web pages with HTML5 Configuring text, color, and page layout with Cascading Style Sheets Configuring images and multimedia on web pages Web design best practices Accessibility, usability, and search engine optimization considerations Obtaining a domain name and web host Publishing to the Web

    The real estate collapse, the economic downturn, burning out on 12-hour workdays – many people are rethinking their ideas about shelter – seeking an alternative to high rents, or a lifelong mortgage debt to a bank on an overpriced home. Homes on land, homes on wheels, homes on the road, homes on water, even homes in the trees. There are also studios, saunas, garden sheds, and greenhouses.There are 1,300 photos, showing a rich variety of small homemade shelters, and there are stories (and thoughts and inspirations) of the owner-builders who are on the forefront of this new trend in downsizing and self-sufficiency. You can buy a ready-made tiny home, build your own, get a kit or pre-fab, or live in a bus, houseboat, or other movable shelter. Some cities have special ordinances for building "in-law" or "granny flats" in the back yard. There are innovative solutions in cities, such as the "capsules" in Tokyo.If you're thinking of scaling back, you'll find plenty of inspiration shown by builders, designers, architects, dreamers, artists, road gypsies, and water dwellers who've achieved a measure of freedom and independence by taking shelter into their own hands.

    Extremely small house, with less than 1,000 square feet of space, are environmentally friendly, less expensive than typical homes, and often movable. Tiny Houses Built with Recycled Materials is full of ideas for using reclaimed materials and upcycled goods to construct a tiny house that is good for the earth and truly unique. Ryan Mitchell, author of The Tiny Life blog, shows you how to repurpose everyday items to create your new home, including shipping containers, salvaged barn wood, and reclaimed shingles. Featuring profiles on tiny house owners with photographs and floor plans of the homes, ideas on where to find materials, and what to look for and avoid when selecting reclaimed materials, Tiny Houses Built with Recycled Materials is a unique book perfect for your biggest DIY project yet!

     Homeowners and renters of all means dream of having a beautiful home. The media makes it look so easy, but many of us have less to work with and still long to live in style. Affordable Interior Design makes luxury an affordable reality. In this DIY home decorating handbook, Helmuth reveals insider tips and her tried-and-tested methods for choosing colors, creating a gallery wall, how to use accent tables, entry benches, rugs, and more! Helmuth has shared her affordable design advice and step-by-step approaches with millions through live teaching workshops, guest columns, television appearances, and interviews. Now, she has distilled her expertise into this practical guide. The chapters follow her secret design formula and include creating a design budget, mapping out floor plans, selecting a color palette, and accessorizing like a stylist. It’s time to start living in the home of your dreams without maxing out your credit cards. Learn how with Affordable Interior Design!

    The term “complexity” can be misleading, however, because what makes West’s discoveries so beautiful is that he has found an underlying simplicity that unites the seemingly complex and diverse phenomena of living systems, including our bodies, our cities and our businesses. Fascinated by issues of aging and mortality, West applied the rigor of a physicist to the biological question of why we live as long as we do and no longer. The result was astonishing, and changed science, creating a new understanding of energy use and metabolism: West found that despite the riotous diversity in the sizes of mammals, they are all, to a large degree, scaled versions of each other. If you know the size of a mammal, you can use scaling laws to learn everything from how much food it eats per day, what its heart-rate is, how long it will take to mature, its lifespan, and so on. Furthermore, the efficiency of the mammal’s circulatory systems scales up precisely based on weight: if you compare a mouse, a human and an elephant on a logarithmic graph, you find with every doubling of average weight, a species gets 25% more efficient—and lives 25% longer. This speaks to everything from how long we can expect to live to how many hours of sleep we need. Fundamentally, he has proven, the issue has to do with the fractal geometry of the networks that supply energy and remove waste from the organism's body. West's work has been game-changing for biologists, but then he made the even bolder move of exploring his work's applicability to cities. Cities, too, are constellations of networks and laws of scalability relate with eerie precision to them. For every doubling in a city's size, the city needs 15% less road, electrical wire, and gas stations to support the same population. More amazingly, for every doubling in size, cities produce 15% more patents and more wealth, as well as 15% more crime and disease. This broad pattern lays the groundwork for a new science of cities. Recently, West has applied his revolutionary work on cities and biological life to the business world. This investigation has led to powerful insights into why some companies thrive while others fail. The implications of these discoveries are far-reaching, and are just beginning to be explored. Scale is a thrilling scientific adventure story about the elemental natural laws that bind us together in simple but profound ways. Through the brilliant mind of Geoffrey West, we can envision how cities, companies and biological life alike are dancing to the same simple, powerful tune, however diverse and unrelated they are to each other.From the Hardcover edition.

    And yet all is not well, Richard Florida argues in The New Urban Crisis. Florida, one of the first scholars to anticipate this back-to-the-city movement in his groundbreaking The Rise of the Creative Class, demonstrates how the same forces that power the growth of the world's superstar cities also generate their vexing challenges: gentrification, unaffordability, segregation, and inequality. Meanwhile, many more cities still stagnate, and middle-class neighborhoods everywhere are disappearing. Our winner-take-all cities are just one manifestation of a profound crisis in today's urbanized knowledge economy. A bracingly original work of research and analysis, The New Urban Crisis offers a compelling diagnosis of our economic ills and a bold prescription for more inclusive cities capable of ensuring growth and prosperity for all.